What A World
by DARK - PLACES
Summary: A group of people struggle to surrvive a world that’s over run by zombies. Despite the horrors of their new world some of them still manage to find love. “Please give feed back on the story.”
1. Introduction

**Introduction:**

The day began like any other day. Wake up. Eat breakfast. Take a shower. Get dressed. Go to school. But today was different, it was my birthday. My parents always let me and my brother stay home on our birthday. You might ask "What happened?", but the truth is nobody really knows, it just happened. Everybody has their own opinion about how it started. Some think it was a biological attack from another country. Other think it was introduced to the general public by our government to reduce the population and it just got out of control. Some people even think it flew in on a meteor and crashed into a mountain somewhere. As for me, I don't really know how it started, all I can do is tell you what I know, and what I've been through.

No one ever expected the world to end, but it did. It was a surprise to everyone. It was so sudden, in the middle of the day, we didn't have any time to prepare. You like to think that your ready for the end, but ... no one is prepared for all the death and distraction. No matter how prepared you are you won't actually be ready. The truth is you will probably be dead within a year. Some people will resort to cannibism. The ones who don't will be forced to kill to stay alive. It's not a place for any child to grow up. I should know, I grew up in this world, and I am haunted by the things that I've done. I was forced to grow up way earlier then I should have, and because of that ... lets just say it's changed me.

I was ten years old when all of this began. I don't really remember a lot from before this happened, I think maybe because I was so young. I do remember some of the things that my dad did before the end. He was always obsessed with preparing for the end of the world, we had seven years worth of food, water, medical, and gardening supplies stored in a secret room in our basement. He taught me and my brother how to fight, how to shoot a gun and firstaid.

Everybody thought that my family was crazy. Little did they know, all these skills would actually pay off. To be honest with you I thought that all this preparation that my dad was doing was pointless. In the end we were the only ones who were prepared. I wish that I had told my friends because if I had then they would probably still be here.


	2. Summer: Day 1

**Summer: Day 1**

I am running down an empty, horribly destroyed, city street. There are bodies all around me. "Jason, where are you!" I yell as I round a corner. I am immediately met with a large group of what I think are zombies, among them is Jason and my parents. I scream at the sight of them and turn around to run away but before I am able to get away I am tacked to the ground. I look up and see Jason starring down at me with blood in his teeth and a crazed look in his eyes. He pins me down and starts snarling and lunges at me. I am fighting to get away from him, but he won't let me go. Just before he bites me I wake up. I sit up in bed gasping and struggling to catch my breath. Tears are pouring down my face. I tell myself "It's only a dream." I lay down and go back to sleep.

I grew up in a small town in Michigan named Vermontville, population: 759 people. I remember that this year was hotter than usual, and we had a drought. The trees were covered in wilted leaves, and the grass was brown. We were going to celebrate my birthday tomorrow. We had finished setting up for the party and had sat down to watch "Dawn of the Dead", it was one of my favorite movies. I remember thinking "That will never happen", when the TV cut to an emergency broadcast about a city wide quarantine, but it didn't specify what for. A few minutes later the TV went to static and then the screaming and the gunshots started.

The news had been reporting a rash of illnesses from all over the country, that appeared to be some sort of viral infection.

"I am hear outside of University of Michigan Hospital where the military has put up barricades to prevent people from entering.

"You need to back away ma'am." A solder says.

The reporter begins questioning a doctor from the CDC, who was wearing a biohazard suit, about the illness. "Do you know what this virus is?" The report asks.

"It's just the flu." The doctor says.

"What are your thoughts about the people who think that the government is not being honest about what this virus is?"

"We don't have a lot of information at this time, and we can only tell the public what we know, and there is nothing knew to report." The doctor says.

"How many people have died from it?" She asks, the doctor starts to walk away. "Is this the same virus that has been plaguing other parts of the country?"

"I'm not aloud to discuss that with you at this time." The doctor says.

"Should we be worried about this virus spreading?" She asks.

"No further questions." The doctor says, then walks away very quickly.

"It appears that the doctors here have nothing new to… There appears to be some commotion coming from inside the hospital."

"You need to get out of here right now!" The solder yells. A few of the patients run out of the hospital, one of them attacks a solder, the other solders start shooting at the patients, but they just keep moving.

"It appears that some of the patients from the hospital have escaped and began attacking the solders." The camera man starts to get nervous. "Jerald, what's the matter with y …" The reporter is interrupted by a patient who bits her on the neck. The cameraman drops the camera and runs. The patient who was biting the reporter looks up and then runs after him. The camera focuses on the puddle of blood that had begun to grow around the reporter's head. A few seconds later the cameraman screams.

We couldn't believe it but the impossible happened. The Zombie Apocalypse. A semi-truck, driving at full speed with its horn blasting, crashes through the house next to ours, where my friend Rachel lived, sending debris flying every direction possible, a large explosion followed shortly after. The ball of fire reached nearly a mile into the sky. We stand in our living room stunned at what had just happened. I was crying so loudly that I was attract the attention of some very unpleasant guests.

Our neighbor, Mr. Morton, busted through the sliding glass door, causing glass to fly everywhere. The first thing that my dad noticed was that his eyes were solid black, then he noticed there was blood coming out of his eyes, nose and mouth. The last thing that he noticed was that his skin was very pale and all of his veins were dark. He stands there hunched over, twitching and making these strange grunting and choking sounds.

"James, are you ok?" My dad asks, with a little hesitation. He takes a couple of steps towards him.

Mr. Morton doesn't answer. He lets out this demonic sounding roar, then snarls and sprints towards us. My Dad grabs a knife and runs in front of us and shoves him back. He falls, like a drunk man, to the floor. He springs to his feet and sprints towards us again.

"Stay back. Stay away James." My dad says. He runs at us again. My dad holds him back. "Stop, James … Don't make me do this!" He yells. I remember the shock on my dads face when James started saying "I'm gonna get ya." He kept repeating it over and over again. The only other thing he said to us was, "I'm gonna tear your faces off."

"What the fuck is wrong with you, James! Just calm down! … Please Stop!" My dad yells while fighting with him.

He continues scratching, snarling and trying to bite my dad, he has no choice but to stab him. He stabs him 2 or 3 more times but he still doesn't stop. James then knocks my dad to the floor, causing the knife that he had in his hand to slid across the floor, James gets close to my dad with his teeth still snapping in his face. He was so close to my dad that I thought for sure he was going to bite him. My dad fumbles for the knife that he had dropped, he manages to reach it, and has no choice but to stab him in the head and he falls limp on top of my dad. We all look at each other with overwhelming shock and horror at what had just happened.

"What do you think happened to him?" Jason asks.

"I have no idea son, but are you guys ok?" My dad asks.

We all look at each other. "Yeah, we're fine" My mom says.

My dad says, "Ok good, I am going to check on his family, you guys should gather up as much food and other supplies as you can. I will help you when I get back."

"But shouldn't we go to the store and gather up as much food as we can carry?"

"No, Jason. Everyone will be doing that, it would be a blood bath, and I don't want to see you or your sister get hurt."

My dad stumbles back through the door a short time later covered in blood. "What happened Dad?" Jason asks.

"I had to … They were …" He buries his face in his hands and begins to sob. As he sobs, the memories of what he had to do to that family replay in his head.

He didn't have to finish his sentence because we all knew what he was trying to say. I couldn't stop crying. His daughter Rachel was one of my friends. Now that I think about it, it's kind of ironic that the we were watching a movie about the zombie apocalypse, and then it actually happened. I remember thinking "There is no way that that could ever happen," but, it did.

"It's ok honey, I'm sure that they are all together on the other side." My mom says, trying to comfort me. It kind of made me feel better when she said that, but I was still really sad.

We finished packing and went to the attic. Some of the food we grabbed had to be cooked in order to eat it, and we did not grab anything to cook with. We went to sleep that night with empty stomachs. But I couldn't sleep, so I went down to the kitchen and gathered up some stuff to cook with. A pot, a big spoon, I filled a milk jug with water, I found some matches, a lighter, newspapers, and magazines and went back up to the attic. My parents were awake when I got back.

"Are you stupid! Do you want to get eaten by those things!" My dad said, with a grim look on his face.

They were not happy until they saw what I had in my hands. They hugged and apologized for yelling at me, then they asked my brother if he wanted food and of course he said "Yes". We had Mac and cheese.

"I can't believe that this has happened." My Dad says.

"Well at least we were prepared for it." I say.

"We were preparing for a nuclear attack, Not the zombie apocalypse!" My Dad says angrily.

"Well at least we have a lot of food and water, most people don't even have that." Jason says.

"Yeah, I suppose that's better than nothing, I just wish that I knew that this is would happen, because we would have prepared for this instead." My Dad says.

It was hard to sleep that first couple of weeks. All you could hear was people screaming, gun shots, and the inhuman roars of the dead. We stayed hidden in the attic of our house for a week, at least I think it was a week, its hard to tell the difference between day and night with no windows to see outside. The whole time telling ourselves that the military would handle it, and that someone would come to rescue us, but no one ever did. So, we stayed as quiet as we could and waited until the screaming stopped. Then for the first time in about a week we went downstairs, and were instantly overcome with shock at how much the world had changed in such a short amount of time.

I remember hearing a girl outside crying, so I tell my dad about it and he doesn't do anything. So I decided to go down and help her. "Where are you going? my dad asks.

"I'm going to help that girl outside, she is crying and needs our help and you won't help her so I will."

"You can't go out there, it's a trick, she'll kill you." My Dad says.

"No she won't she is just scared and I'm going to let her know that she is not the only one left." I say with a little anger in my voice.

"Wait, look." My Dad says pointing toward her. She was hunched over and twitching. I remember thinking "That's a little odd." A man comes out of his house to help her.

"Ma'am, it's ok I'm here to help." He says. She continues to cry and says "Help me," so he gets a little closer and says "Its ok, I'm here to help." He reaches towards her to put a hand on her shoulder but before he does she stops crying and spins around like a blur and jumps on him and sinks her teeth into his neck, he let out the loudest scream I had ever heard which attracted more of them. I watched in horror as they tore him apart. The only thing left of him was a very large puddle of blood, and a few bits of flesh that they hadn't eaten.

My dad looks at me and says, "That could have been you, next time I say something you better listen." It was then that I then realized that they were smart. They were not the normal slow moving zombies, that you see in the movies, they were really fast.

After a few days, the only sound left was car alarms from the dead bumping into a car and setting it off. That was the safest time to go look for survivors because all the nearby zombies would be attracted to the sound.

We went from house to house looking for survivors. We would knock on the door, and if no one answered then we would enter the house and call out to anyone who might be inside. If we didn't find anyone then we would search the house for anything useful. I felt bad about looting the houses.

"What's wrong Alice?" My dad asks.

"I don't want to steal from these houses, dad." I say

"I know honey but we have to take this stuff to survive." He says.

"But what if they come back?" I ask.

"Most likely they won't." He says

"But what if they do? Shouldn't we leave a note or something to tell them where their stuff is?" I ask.

"Well it couldn't hurt to leave a note." He says, thinking to himself, "They're already dead."

During our search we found a couple of other families and a dog named Gina. It started to get dark so we lead everyone back to our house. We offered them food and water and told them they were welcome to stay as long as they wanted. We also told them that we were going to look for more survivors in the morning and they could help if they wanted.

One person that we found was a boy who was a couple of years older then me. His name was Jeremiah. My dad had to kill a couple of zombies to get to him. He didn't say anything for that first week or so that we were in the attic, and he hardly ate anything.

We found several more people during our search. Our group now had a total of 15 people. But now there were too many people in our group to fit them in our attic so we went back to our house and gathered up anything of use. I gathered up some other stuff, like books, sketchbooks, journals, art supplies and clothes.

While we packed up, My dad took the car to look for a bigger vehicle.

"Take Gina with you so that she can warn you if there is danger." My mom said.

"That's a good idea maybe she can give me a little more warning that there are zombies or people nearby." My Dad says in response to what mom said.

While we waited for my dad to return we did one last sweep of the neighborhood in an attempt to find anyone who may have returned to their house to retrieve their belongs. Sadly we didn't find anyone.

He drove past the middle school and found a school bus that was big enough to fit everyone and our supplies on it. He brought it back to the house and we all gathered up our supplies and loaded onto the bus.

"Alice, take some people with you and gather everything from our shelter. Don't leave anything, and make it fast because I don't know how much longer the dead will be distracted."

"Okay, dad." I say.

After we finished gathering the supplies from the secret room in our basement, we returned to the school to search for anything of use and survivors, we didn't find anyone, but we did find some food in the cafeteria, snacks, fruit and a lot of water. Before we left the school we siphoned gas from the other buses and vehicles.

The rest of the week was spent looking for supplies, people, and a safe place that was large enough for everyone. I saw a library during our search.

"Can we stop at the library dad? Please?" I ask.

"Fine but make it fast." My Dad says, in an irritated tone.

I went into the library to look for books that might be useful, like books on locale wildlife, and various types of survival books.

My dad drove us to some convenience stores and we looked for more food, weapons and supplies. we left the stores to search for more survivors. After that we found a large hotel and made camp at it. The only problem with it was all the zombies. My dad told me and the other kids to stay on the bus while they cleaned out the hotel. They used the abandoned vehicles to block off all the entrances. We unloaded all of our supplies into rooms in the hotel. My parents picked a room for that had two beds so that we could all stay together.

"Oh my god!" My dad yells. My mom, Jason and I rush over to the room that he was standing in front of.

"What is it dad?" I say as I walk around the corner.

"Alice don't come in here!" My dad says, but before he finishes his sentence I am already in the room. I am horrified but what I see. There is a couple laying on the bed next to each other, holding hands, They both have a gun in their other hand. Around their heads is a large puddle of blood. They had self inflicted gunshot wounds to their heads, Then my mom makes a discovery, They had both been bitten.

"I guess that they didn't want to turn so they shot themselves." My dad says.

"Yeah, I guess so. My mom says. "We should bury them."

"Yeah." My dad says.

I think that was probably one of the worst things that I had ever seen. I just couldn't understand how he world had gotten this bad so fast. After my parents finished burying the couple, we did our best to make it a home suitable for us to live in. At this point our group had thirteen people.

We were here for about a week, then the power shut off. Everyone thought that we could handle a situation like this but we were wrong. 50% of the world's population was gone within the first 5 years. And with no one to tend to the fields we soon began to run out of food. People were killing each other over scraps. It was a bloodbath, it was madness, more horrible than your worst nightmare.

I was ten years old when the world ended. Too young to grow up, and too young to see all the things that I've seen. One of the worst things that I ever saw was a family all mangled in their house. So much blood, they were torn to pieces. They must have tried to fight back. They took out a few of them from the looks of the scene, but they were clearly out numbered. I can still see them when I close my eyes. My brother Jason, was eighteen. He had it a little worse then I did. When we left our home town he wanted to check on his girlfriend. When we got to her house, we saw all the people. They had been gunned down. He ran up the stairs to her room, calling her name. He saw her leaning up against the wall in her closet, a blood puddle surrounding her on the wall and floor. She must have tried to hide in her closet. Someone shot her in the head.

It has been eight years since the world was normal. Eight years spent in this hotel, living with the minimum amount of food. You might be wondering how we were able to survive in this hotel for as long as we did, the truth is I guess we were just lucky. My dad was voted leader of the group I think because he has a natural authority that everyone respects. While we were at the hotel we lost seven people; two to illness and one by their own hands, and the other four left in search of uninfected areas and lost family members. When ever a zombie got too close to us we would send someone out there to take care of it as quickly and as quietly as possible. Our group now had twenty-three people in it.

The next tragedy that hit me and my brother was the death of our parents. They died with in a year of each other, my mom was the first to go. She was always trying to help people. She was working on this guy who got shot in the stomach, she over looked the bit on his shoulder, and he turned before we had time to react. He lunged at my mom and bit her on the neck, there was nothing we could do. She made my dad promise not to let her turn. We stayed with her as long as we could, … then … she quit breathing … and my dad had to shoot her.

A few months later, my dad went, but he died a little differently. My dad was protecting me and my brother from a horde of zombies and was overpowered just as me and my brother escaped through a large hole in the ceiling of a grocery store. The last thing he said to us was "I love you both so much". Then he started yelling at us to run as far away from the area as we could. We got about 50 yards or so away and then heard a single gunshot. We returned to the group with the little bit of food we managed to get before the zombies broke the doors down. When they saw that our dad wasn't with us they all began to cry, with all the noise we were making, a large group of zombies broke through the barrier and attacked us. But we were able to kill all of them.

We were lucky that no one died but we didn't have a lot of food left, so my brother told us all to pack up everything that was left, with our shelter and our safety compromised we needed to find somewhere else to go because the hotel was no longer safe. So everyone loaded onto the bus and we drove off in search of somewhere else to live.


	3. Summer: Day 2981

Summer: Day 2981

After the eighth year of the apocalypse supplies were next to impossible to find. We had to travel greater and greater distances and we were lucky if we could find so much as a can of food. Some of our group had left to find family or somewhere were the infection had not reached. We all wished the luck. One family had taken Gina with them for an extra warning for when the zombies were near by. They had four young children, so my dad felt that they needed Gina more than we did.

We were on the road for a few days before we found somewhere else that was safe. We ended up living in an airport, we figured since there were fences surrounding most of the building that it would be a good place to live. We searched the building for zombies but we didn't find very many, and we were relieved, and surprised. After we did a full sweep of the entire airport, we started taking the bodies outside because of the horrid smell, and to make it a little more like a home. The airport's generator still worked so we had power. As long as we had gas and the generator worked we would be ok. We had TV and running water, and radio so we could stay updated on the situation, but one day the reports just stopped, and all that was left was static. We went to the local zoo and found a tranquilizer gun and about 30 darts, we decide decided to go look for animals that we could farm. We found pigs, cows, goats, sheep, chickens, we even found a couple of horses that were tame enough to ride. We made sure that there was at least one male of each species of animal that we had. We blocked off some of the ground for gardening, and there was a pond so that the animals would have water to drink. We kept one chicken in with a rooster for breeding, so that we didn't have to worry about accidentally eating a fertilized egg.

We were searching some of the nearby houses for more people and supplies. We found a 7 year old girl with a baby in her arms hiding in a closet.

"Where are your parents hunn?" I asked.

"My dad got infected. After three days he died. Then he came back and killed my mom and older brother, but I was able to grab my brother and hide in the closet, and I have Been here for three days." Madilyn said, as a few tears fell down her cheek.

"That's so terrible. We lost both of our parents too, so … I know how you feel. We have a group of survivors at the airport if you want to come with us." I say, with the same amount of sadness in my voice.

"Ok that would be great, because I am starving." Madilyn says.

"Well we have plenty of food so you can eat all you want. My name is Alice and this is my brother is Jason. What's your name." I say.

"I'm Madilyn, I'm 7 and this is Isaiah, he is 4 months old." She says.

"It's nice to meet you, you know I wasn't that much older than you were when this horrible tragedy began." I say.

There is a low moan of in the distance. "We should get going before they catch up to us." Jason says.

We rushed back to the airport to avoid danger. We were all settled in and made it like a home, when everything started going wrong. A large group of people showed up outside the fence, they started making threats and demanding supplies. My brother refused to give them what they wanted and told them to leave because they were messing with the wrong people. We were all settled in and made it like a home, when everything started going wrong. A few people showed up outside the fence, they started demanding supplies.

"We don't have a lot of supplies." Jason says.

"I don't care give us supplies or we will come take them." The stranger she demandingly.

"We have kids in our group, would you really take food from them?" I say.

They yelled out a few more insults and threats and then left. We thought that we wouldn't see them again, but we were wrong. A few weeks later they returned but this time they had about 50 people with them.

"We can do this the easy way or the hard way. It's up to you I don't care either way, but we are getting those supplies." The stranger says angrily.

I whisper to my brother, " Maybe we should just give them what they want, after all they do out number us."

"Alice, I can't just stand here and watch while these terrible people come into our home and take whatever they want." Jason says.

"I know Jason, I don't like it either, but I don't want to see anyone get killed. And besides I have been storing supplies in places where no one would ever think to look, so don't worry we won't be left with nothing." I say.

"Really?" Jason asked.

"Yeah, part of me knew that something like this would happen at some point." I answered.

"How long have you been doing that?" Jason asked.

"Pretty much since we first came here." I stated.

"Well in that case I guess that they can have this place." Jason says.

"Hey! Are you gonna give us what we want or do we have to take it by force?" The stranger yells questioningly at us.

"It's not worth the lives of all these good people, so you can have it, just let us get out of your way first." Jason says.

"Ok good now hurry up!" The stranger yells.

We run inside to tell everyone to get out as fast as they can. I run back to my room and grab my bag full of books and sketch pads and then run to help Madilyn pack up the baby supplies. The we all run out of the gate and hand over control of the airport to the group of strangers who felt that they needed it more.

"What is in those bags that you are trying to sneak out of here." The stranger asks angrily

"Just some books and baby stuff for the baby in that girl's arms." I say.

"Well that's fine you can take that stuff we don't have a use it." The stranger says.

We all loaded up into the bus once again and set off for the locations of my supply stashes. My brother drove us to the locations and I went out to get them. When everyone saw what I was doing they were so happy that some of them started to cry.

"I thought that those people had taken everything from us." Jason says.

"Why didn't you tell us that you were doing this? We would have helped you." Tommy asks.

"I know everyone I just didn't want to put any of you in danger." I say.

"I get that but I wish that you would have told us, because I don't like the idea of you going out there into all that chaos by your self." Jason says.

"I'm not a little kid anymore, and I know how to use a gun." I say.

We had gone to several locations to get supplies. Each time dividing them amongst the others in the group.

"How many locations are left, Jason?" Tommy asks.

He looks down at the map. "Thirteen."

After we gathered up all of the supplies, we began to look for another safe place. We searched and searched for days but couldn't find anything. Suddenly something happened that made us all lose hope. The bus we were in began to smoke and sputter, then it ground to a halt.

"God Damn it!" Jason shouted while pounding on the steering wheel.

"Jason, watch your language there are kids around." I say.

"I know, I'm sorry. I'm just so tired of nothing going our way." He says.

"I know, I am too but getting mad isn't and cursing isn't going to help our situation at all, and besides I saw a train station a little ways back, if we follow the tracks you might find the train. Maybe we could use that as a shelter for a while, or maybe even get it running." I say.

"I don't know, what do you guys think? Should we do it?" Jason asks the group.

"Yeah!" Everyone says in unison.

"Alright everyone pack it up and let's get out of here." Jason says.

As we were walking back to the train station we hear a blood curdling scream.

"Change of plans everyone, let's go check that out." I say.

What we found was a girl standing on top of a truck hacking off the limbs of the zombies that were reaching up at her. I run to help her with my machete in hand I begin to work my way toward her, killing one zombie at a time.

"Alice! Look out!" Jason shouted to me.

As I turned around a zombie tackles me to the ground and starts trying to bite me. Jason runs to help me, everyone else who had a weapon went to help the girl. He pulls the zombie off of me and quickly kills it t, then he helps me to my feet.

"You need to be more care. I what if I wasn't able to get to you in time." Jason said in a frustrated tone.

"I know, I just got distracted." I answered, with my hands on my knees trying to catch my breath.

"We'll be careful because next time I may not be able to get to you quick enough." Jason stated. The way he said that… he sounded like Dad.

My group had cleared out all the zombies and the girl was safe.

"How old are you kid?" Jason asked.

"I'm not a kid!" She yelled.

"Oh sorry, how old are you?" Jason asks.

"I am 24 years old." She says.

"Really? You don't look 24. The you look more like 12." Jason asks.

"I know everyone thinks that but I have a disease that causes me to look like a child." She says.

"Well that's good, in a way." Jason says.

"Not really it's kind of a curse, I'm doomed to look like a child for the rest of my life."

"Well my name is Jason and I'm 26, and Alice, my little sister, is 15. What is your name?" He says.

"Sarah." The girl says.

"That's a nice name, anyway you can join us if you want to, you'd probably be safer with us than on your own." Jason says.

"Well I guess that I can join you until I get where I am going." Sarah says.

"That's good news because we can always use more people, even if they only stay for a little while." Jason says.

We begin making our way to the train station again. This time we are uninterrupted, but when we get there we discover hundreds of zombies their waiting for us. As quietly as we can we turn around and leave. My brother comes up with this idea to lure them out so that we could get in without any problems. He pulls out his gun and fires a few shots into the air. We hear a ruckus from in the train station. Then the zombies pour out of the train station.

My brother suddenly realizes the shear number of zombies in the horde, so as a distraction he runs in the other direction firing shots into the air as he goes to keep them interested in him and not us. When all of the zombies are out of site we enter the train station.

"Okay everyone, let's wait here for my brother to get back." I say.

After a little while I start to get nervous. And I hope that my brother is ok. So I decided to go look for him.

"Alright I'm gonna go look for my brother. Sarah and Joe, come with me." I say.see

We exit the station and begin to follow the direction that my brother and the zombies went. Suddenly I see my brothers gun on the ground so I pick it up and continue to walk down the street. A little further down and there is a few puddles of blood. I begin to get nervous and tears begin to well up in my eyes. I continue to walk expecting to find my brother's lifeless body laying on the street but I don't I only find more blood. I notice a bloody handprint on a nearby building. The hand print then turns into a bloody smear on the wall leading towards the double doors. We enter the building and find my brother sitting on the floor.

"What happened Jason why didn't you come back?" I ask.

He doesn't say anything, he just looks down at his lap. I then notice all the blood.

"What happened?" I ask again.

He sighs. "One of those damn zombies bite me on my hand when I was trying to push it away."

Suddenly Sarah grabs her machete and in a single motion cuts of my brothers hand just past the wrist. My brother screams, not at the pain, but at the sight of his hand on the ground and all of the blood spurting into the air. I push Sarah away from him and scream, "What are you doing!"

"Saving your brothers life, now let me go before he bleeds to death." She says.

She goes to work doing her best to stop the bleeding. When he is stable enough we help him to his feet and walk back to the train station.

I remember what Madilyn had said about her dad when he got bit. "We have three days until he starts to show symptoms. So hopefully what you did works."

We rejoin the group a short while later.

Tommy about jumps out of his skin when he sees Jason. "What happened?"

"He got bit on his hand, but Sarah cut it off." Joel says.

We wait in the train station for two days to see if he starts to show symptoms, but he doesn't.

Jason walks over and sits on the floor next to Sarah.

"How did you know cutting my hand off would stop the infection?" Jason asks.

"To be honest, I didn't. I just took a shot and hoped for the best." Sarah says.

"Well I'm glad you tried instead of just shooting me." Jason says. Then he leans over and kisses her … It's weird to think that in a situation as terrible as this that people can still fall in love. The kiss was long and passionate, then he stands up. "We move out in the morning, so be ready."

I wake up a little later that night to moaning and groaning sounds, my first instinct is to grab my gun. When I stand up I realize that the sounds are not from a zombie but from my brother and Sarah. My face turns red with embarrassment but it was so dark that I don't think my brother knew that I was awake. I go outside to keep look out for zombies, and to get away from their sounds.

I sat down on the ground outside the station. I was so exhausted from the lack of sleep that I didn't even realize that I had fallen asleep. I dreamt of how life was before the years of this tragedy. Of school, and my parents. I woke up to a warm salty tear running down my face. I began to cry for the first time in a long time. I still couldn't believe that my parents died the way that they did. The thought of that terrible tragedy would not leave my mind no matter how much I tried to not think about it.

To keep myself from thinking about it I exercised. I ran around the block, and up and down the stairs. I guess I was making too much noise because I woke up Isaiah. He was crying so loud that he attracted the attention of some nearby zombies. I run down the stairs as quickly as I can to warn everyone. Everyone scrambles as quickly as they can to pack up, Madilyn does as much as she can to quiet Isaiah down. Shortly before dawn a large horde of zombies came stumbling down the road towards the train station. I barely had time to warn everyone. They began to pour down into the station, most of them running full speed at us, the rest of them just stumbled around before we were able to pack up. Me, Jason and a few other people kill as many of the zombies as we can to buy time for everyone to pack up their stuff. Once everyone has finished packing we leave. Everyone scrambled to get out of the train station. We had all managed to escape with our supplies, but not everyone escaped with their lives. We lost 4 people, 1 of which was Jason's friend Tommy. Sarah was there to help me pull him out of the station.


	4. Fall: Day 3070

Yet again we were on the search for a safety. This time we were not having any luck finding somewhere to stay for a while. We stopped to sleep in an abandoned city bus. While everyone else slept me and my brother talked about what to do about the lack of supplies.

"I know what you're going to say but I think that we need to go to a city. I think that it's our best chance of finding supplies." I say.

"No, that is a really bad idea. It would be suicide." Jason says.

Suddenly, Sarah says, "Your sister is right we have drained every small town of anything of use so, I think that it's about time that we move into the city."

"Ok, you're right, but I still don't like the idea. But in any case I'll tell everyone of our plan in the morning. We should try and get some sleep before we have to get moving again." Jason says.

After a while of trying to sleep and failing, I give up. I look around the bus and notice that Sarah is still awake. "You cant sleep either can you?" I ask.

"Nope, … I haven't slept well since this whole thing started." Sarah says.

"I don't think anyone has slept good since it started." I say.

"Yeah, how could you, with people dying all over the place and those things moaning and groaning constantly?" She asks, rhetorically.

"Yeah, anyway where were you when this all started?" I ask.

"Well, I was staying in a cabin with my family up in the mountains. They didn't have a TV, and cell phones didn't work because you couldn't get a signal way out there. We packed everything up and went to return home, expecting everything to be the way that it was when we left, but when we got into town, we saw all the dead bodies and blood. We were driving down the road to go to our house when a girl runs out in front of our car. She was covered in blood and ash, and she smelled like death." She says.

"Please help! Let me in, I need your help!" A girl yells as she runs up to my parents car.

"What are you doing honey, let her in." June says.

My dad unlocks the car door and lets her in, then he asks "What's going on around here, where is everyone?"

"Are you serious? Everyone is dead and there are monsters all over the place, where have you been?" She asks.

"We were in a cabin up in the woods." Daniel says.

"Oh, well you should have stayed there its not safe here." The girl says.

"Yeah I guess so, we were going to our house to get some stuff, your welcome to come with us." Daniel says.

"Thanks that would be great, I haven't eaten anything in almost a week." The girl says

"That's terrible, we have plenty of food so you can eat as much as you want. My name is June, this is my husband Daniel and our daughter Sarah. What's your name?" June says.

"Samantha, but my friends call me Sam. Hopefully your house is ok, because when it started everyone began to vandalize houses, they would ransack them looking for food, water, and weapons. Some houses were even destroyed during the panic." Sam says.

"It's nice to meet you Sam. Do you have any idea how bad has it spread?" Daniel asks.

"There's no way to know how bad it is, but my guess is that it has spread across the country by now, maybe even across the world." Sam says.

"Oh my god, do you know how it started? Daniel asks.

"No, no one does but some people believe that a virus was accidentally released from a nearby C.D.C lab, but I don't know if it is true or not." Sam says.

"How many people are left in town?" Daniel asks.

"As far as I know I'm the only one left in town, everyone else is either dead, a zombie, or left town." Sam says.

"Wait. Did you just say zombie?" Daniel asks.

"Yeah. Zombies, they eat and eat. That's all they do." Sam says.

"I would never have imagined in a million years that this would ever happen." Daniel says.

"Dad, do you think that my friends are okay?" Sarah asks.

"I certainly hope so, honey." Daniel says.

Later I found out that most of my friends had been killed. I was so depressed because I wished that I had taken them with me. I blamed my dad for their deaths.

"Why didn't you let me them come with us? It's your fault that they're dead!" Sarah yells.

"No it's not. If we had brought them with us then their parents would have worried about them and they would have worried about their parents." Her dad says.

After a few years, we found our selves in a terrible situation. Sam had been bit by a zombie that came out of nowhere. My dad killed it but then more started pouring in and we ran as fast as we could. When we got away from the hoard, Sam and my parents I asked about what to do.

"What should we do, Sam has been bit so you know what's going to happen now." Daniel stated.

"Should we leave her behind?" June asks.

"We can't just leave her like that, I wouldn't want to be left alone, we need to do something." Sarah says with a little anger in her voice.

"Just cut it off. Please, I'll do anything, I don't want to be one of those things. I don't want to die." Sam yells while crying.

My dad grabs a piece of wood and hits her on the head knocking her out. While she's unconscious my dad cuts her arm off. Then stitches it shut and wraps it with a towel. Later on when she wakes up my dad asks her if she is feeling any symptoms. She says no, but she says that her arm really hurts and she is tiered. We didn't think too much of it. My dad thought that it was just because she had lost a lot of blood. But we were wrong.

Later that night, I was awoken by a loud crash in the room next to mine. I hear screams coming from my parents room, then silence. Suddenly Sam comes sprinting into my room. At first I thought that she was scared, but then I saw the blood dripping from her mouth, her eyes were solid black, and her skin was very pale and all of her veins were visible. I yelled for my parent but they didn't respond or run into the room. Sam suddenly charges at me full speed. I barley had time to grab my gun and shoot her. When she fell to the ground and lay motionless, I ran into my parents room and was horrified by what I saw. There was blood everywhere. I gathered up as much stuff as I could carry and ran out of there as fast as I could and I just kept going, I was on my own until you guys found me."

"How long were you alone?" I ask

"Since the first year." She says.

"That is so terrible, but if Sam turned after your dad cut her arm off, why did you try it again with my brother's hand?" I ask.

"Well, I thought that we had waited too long to cut her arm off. So when I cut Jason's hand off I hoped that the bite was still fairly fresh, plus I like Jason a lot so I did everything that I could to keep him alive." Sarah says.

"I'm glad that you care about him so much. It makes me happy to see him happy. We've had such a rough life, especially Jason. I just wish that I could find someone to connect with like Jason did." I say.

"Well, I'm sure that you will." Sarah says.

"Yeah, I'm not so sure about that." I say.

"I am, I know someone who has had their eye on you since he first met you." Sarah says.

"Really? Who?" I ask.

"Jeremiah." Sarah says.

"Really? I thought that he just wanted to be friends." I say.

"Nope. He asked me a couple days ago how to get a girl to like him. I knew that he was talking about you so I gave him some advise. I told him to just go for it and see what happens. But if I were you I would make a move because I don't think he is going to." Sarah says.

"Okay. Maybe I will, but right now, I think that we should sleep." I say.

"Yeah, your right. Good night." Sarah says.

"Good night." I say as I walk back to my seat.

I waited for what I think was an hour, so that I could be sure that Sarah was asleep. I walked over to where Jeremiah was sleeping as quietly as I could, I step one leg over him and sit on him. He wakes up and looks at me with a confused look on is face.

"What are you doing Alice? He asks."

I lean forward and kiss him, then I say, " I know that you like me, and I want you to know that I feel the same about you."

"Really? That's good, but how did you know?" Jeremiah asks.

"I would have to be blind to not notice the way that you look at me." I say.

He looks a little embarrassed. But he smiles at me and sits forward and kisses me for a long time. We were interrupted by a loud crash. It sounded like a bomb went off, but there was no light. It was so loud that it woke everyone up. I scramble to get off of him before anyone notices.

Joel stands up and says, "What was that?"

"I have no idea. Sarah, let's go check it out." Jason says.

"Okay Jason." Sarah says.

Jason and Sarah leave to go check out the sound. When they return the sun is up. They had to of been gone for at least 2 hours. I think that I know why, but I'm not going to ask them, because I really don't care.

"Did you figure out what the sound was?" I ask.

"Yeah, Part of a building collapsed." Jason says.

"Okay, why didn't you come back when you figured out what it was?" Jason doesn't answer me, which confirms my suspicion.

Joel walks over to Jason and says, "What are you going to do if she gets pregnant?"

Jason says, "She wont, we've been very carful."

"Well for your sake I hope so, because raising a baby in a time like this is not easy, just ask Madilyn. She has been raising her baby brother by herself, and she is just a kid, so that can't be easy. Every time he cries he attracts the dead. If Sarah has a baby to, then that would be one more baby to attract attention to us." Joel says.

Madilyn jumps into the conversation and says, "What are you getting at?" With an angry tone.

"I didn't mean for what I said to offend you, I just meant that it's not easy to take care of a baby right now, with the way that the world is." Joel says apologetically.

"Yeah, your right. It's not easy to take care of a child at my age. Some times it can be dangerous, for both us and the baby. It is most dangerous when we don't have a place to stay. But having another baby around would give someone for Isaiah to play with." Madilyn says.

After Madilyn said that, everyone was quiet. About as quiet as we all were when the end began. It was eyrie, and the silence was deafening. Jeremiah pulls me off to the side.

"What was with you last night?" Jeremiah asks.

"What do you mean?" I reply.

"You kissed me." He says.

"Oh, yeah I did. Did you like it?" I ask.

"Yeah, but why all of a sudden did you decide to kiss me? Why not do it earlier?" He asks.

"Well, I guess I didn't want to embarrass myself, and I needed to be sure that you felt the same why about me that I had for you. Plus I was tiered of waiting for you to make a move." I explain.

"Oh." He says quietly.

We remained on the bus for 2 or 3 more days. Then we decide to continue looking for a shelter. We were in more of a rush than usual to find a place to stay because it was starting to get cold, and we didn't want the baby or anyone else to get sick. Winters in the north are very harsh. We can get blizzards, and quit often we get white outs, and the snow can come up to your knees, or higher. I remember one year, when I was little, it was 14 degrees below zero. The snow was so deep that we couldn't open our door. The weather people issued a warning for everyone to stay inside and to avoid travel if at all possible. I hope that we don't have a repeat of that this year, because we will be trapped and unable to look for food, we could starve.

With winter on a fast approach, we needed to find clothes that are more suited to the weather. In our rush to leave the airport, we left all of our seasonal clothes behind. The problem is that all those extra cloths are going to double are load, and we have no vehicle so we are stuck carrying everything. When night fell, we took shelter in a grocery store. Everyone was asleep when Isaiah started to cry. Madilyn woke up to tend to him.

"I'll get him hunn, go back to sleep. As young as you are you need as much sleep as you can get." I say.

"Okay." Madilyn says.

I pick him up and start walking around the store, but he continues to cry. I remember my mom telling me that she use to sing to me to get me to go back to sleep. I was never a big fan of singing around people, but everyone was asleep, so I give it a try.

"She was driving last Friday on her way to Cincinnati

On a snow white Christmas Eve

Going home to see her Mama and her Daddy with the baby in the backseat

Fifty miles to go and she was running low on faith and gasoline

It'd been a long hard year

She had a lot on her mind and she didn't pay attention

She was going way too fast

Before she knew it she was spinning on a thin black sheet of glass

She saw both their lives flash before her eyes

She didn't even have time to cry

She was so scared

She threw her hands up in the air

Jesus take the wheel

Take it from my hands

Cause I can't do this on my own

I'm letting go

So give me one more chance

Save me from this road I'm on

Jesus take the wheel"

"You have a beautiful voice." Jeremiah says from behind me.

"You startled me." I say after I spin around to look at him.

"Sorry, I didn't mean to." He says.

"I know its ok. You really think that I'm a good singer?" I ask.

"Yeah. Can I ask you something?" He asks.

"Yeah sure." I say.

"Why did you pick that song to sing to Isaiah?" He asks.

"Well it was one of my favorite songs when I was a kid. I wish we had power because I would love to listen to that song again." I say.

"I like that song too." He says.

"Really?" I ask.

"Yeah…" He puts a hand on my face, and with his other hand, he grabs my hand, and then leans forward and kisses me for a few seconds. "But I like it more when you sing it."

"Just a minute. I'm going to put him back to bed. I'll be right back, stay here." I return Isaiah to his bed and look around to make sure that everyone is asleep. then I return to Jeremiah. He kisses me for awhile, then he leads me into to a changing room and locks the door.

"What are we doing in here?" I ask.

"Don't you want a little privacy?" He asks.

"Yeah, I guess." He starts to kiss me again, then he pushes me back into the wall of the changing room. I wrap my arms around his neck. After a little while he starts to pull at my shirt and I get a little nervous.

"I've never done this before." I say.

"Neither have I. I'm only 2 years older than you, but don't you want your first time to be with a friend?" He says.

"Yeah, It would be nice to spend that time with someone who really care for me the way that you do." He kisses me again, and unbuttons my plaid shirt, and pulls it off.

He stairs at me for a second. "What are those scars from?"

Tears begin to form in my eyes as I explain. " I use to spend whole summers at my uncles house. He drank a lot, because his wife left him. Sometimes he would yell at me and my cousin, and sometimes he would use me as an ash tray, and he would beat me and my cousin."

"What are these ones from?" He asks as he turns my arms over.

"It was my way of dealing with pain. Some of them are because of being bullied at school but the rest are because of my uncle." I say.

"I'm so sorry that all of this happened to you, but I have a lot of scars too, so don't be embarrassed." He says, then he takes his shirt off, and I stare at him for a minute. I had never seen him without a shirt on before. He is a lot more muscular than I thought he was. He always wore baggy cloths, so I just thought that he was really skinny. He was really attractive. I couldn't stop staring at him, and he noticed.

"Is something wrong?" He asks.

"No, sorry. Your just really buff." I say.

"Yeah. So?" He says.

"I like It." I say, then I stand on my toes and kiss him. He unbuttons my jeans and pulls them down. He grabs my hands and puts them on the waistband of his cargo pants, as if to tell me to take his pants off without actually saying it, so I do. He sits down on the bench and pulls me on to his lap. He takes off the rest of my cloths and his, then he pushes me to the floor and lays on top of me, and kisses me. A tear falls down my face.

"What's wrong?"

"I am a horrible person."

"No your not." He says. " You're one of the nicest people I have ever met."

"I have killed people."

"We've all killed people."

"Yeah but were we all twelve? That's way too young to have to do something like that."

"I'm sure that you had no other choice."

"I didn't, but I also didn't feel bad about it."

"You're not a bad person. I don't always feel bad when I kill people either." Then kisses me until I stop crying.

Then he whispers in my ear, "Are you sure that you are ready for this?"

I whisper back, "Yes."

He puts one of his warm, soft hands over my mouth and whispers, "Shh, you'll wake up the others." We remain in the changing room for about an hour.

"We should get back to the others and try and get a few hours of sleep, Jason wants to start moving again at dawn." He says.

We were getting dressed and I happen to look over at Jeremiah before he puts his shirt back on. He had scars on his back.

"What are those scars from, if you don't mind me asking." I ask.

He puts his shirt on and then turns around. "Before you and your family saved me, and before all of this, I didn't have the best relationship with my dad. He would whip me with a belt. One day at school, they did a swimming class. I took off my shirt to get in the water and everybody stared at me. One of the teachers pulled me out of class and asked me what had happened to my back, but I wouldn't tell them. Because of that, they called my mom. When she arrived she told them what had been happening. She told them that if she said anything to him he would hit her too, sometimes hard enough to knock her out. The next day some cops came to the door and arrested my dad. About a year later she got remarried. The guy that she married was so nice to me, he never even yelled at me. But… then everything changed. The world changed. My mom and my new dad got sick, and that's when we met." He says.

"I am so sorry." I say, as tears begin to roll down my checks.

"Its ok." He says. Then he kisses me one last time before we go back to bed.

"Alright everyone, pack it up and look for anything of use, food, water, ammo, clothes, weapons… and make it fast, I want to be on the move before those things catch our scent."

I was running low on art supplies so I decided to go to the arts and crafts section to load up on my stuff before we leave. After that I went to the tools section and found some items that I could use as weapons, hammers, screw drivers, crowbars, etc. I returned to the group with two extra bags. Once everyone met up at the front of the store we were on the road again.


End file.
